Month: January 2018

The only work of “fiction” cracks the list at number fifteen. I put fiction in quotes at its really a philosophical textbook intermingled with a novel about a father and son cross-country roadtrip. It’s worth noting that the author just passed away a few months ago. The New York Times obituary and retro-review of the book do it justice, and concludes with the epilogue Pirsig himself wrote for the novel:

“There is a Swedish word, kulturbärer, which can be translated as “culture-bearer” but still doesn’t mean much. It’s not a concept that has much American use, although it should have….

Culture-bearing books challenge cultural value assumptions and often do so at a time when the culture is changing in favor of their challenge. The books are not necessarily of high quality. Uncle Tom’s Cabin was no literary masterpiece but it was a culture-bearing book. It came at a time when the entire culture was about to reject slavery. People seized upon it as a portrayal of their own new values and it became an overwhelming success….

This book offers another, more serious alternative to material success. It’s not so much an alternative as an expansion of the meaning of “success” to something larger than just getting a good job and staying out of trouble. And also something larger than mere freedom. It gives a positive goal to work toward that does not confine. That is the main reason for the book’s success, I think. The whole culture happened to be looking for exactly what this book has to offer. That is the sense in which it is a culture-bearer.”

I was hesitant to even review this because it’s a long paper (about 50 pages), and wasn’t published as a book. But it’s length just passes my threshold, and it’s such an important read that I had to share it. The author is a billionaire investor only occasionally recognized outside the financial industry. This paper, written at the height of the 1990s dot-com bubble, served as not only an accurate predictor of the bubble-burst, but a precise one. Asness’s mathematical takedown of bubble logic is swiftly and decisively deconstructs human’s poor decision making abilities. Given what we have seen in the past year in the cryptocurrency markets and in the mid-2000s real estate bubble, it’s as relevant as ever.

Taleb is a bit of a cult hero these days, and this book is what started it. While I was in college (2008-2012), this book (published in 2007) became a sensation in the financial community for its ability to not only predict the financial crisis, but provide a mathematical and philosophical framework (informed from the author’s own experience in the financial industry in the 1980s) for understanding its causes and consequences. While not everyone likes his writing style, his messages are too important to be ignored.

This two-part tale shines a bright light on the dangerous, long-held myths about “business management”. A former management consultant recounts his own time in the industry (both at top name-brand firms and spin-off independents) and researches the history of “management theory” starting from the industrial revolution. What he finds is obvious to those least empowered to change these practices: most of traditional consulting industry theory is either outdated or was never accurate to begin with, are filled with scientism, and the real answers are much closer to social science and philosophy than business school. It’s a fantastic insider expose on an industry which exists to capitalize on people’s weaknesses inside large organizations.

Often, doing the right thing is hard. It’s even harder when “the establishment” is completely against you. David Einhorn, professional investor and unintended detective, writes his memoir of his hunt to take down corrupt and shady business loan provider Allied Capital. It covers all my favorite topics in a non-fiction story: An underdog raging against the machine, simple explanations of complex financial industry minutiae, and a detective story of real-world big business corruption. I thank David for documenting his service to society.

In a brief 100-or-less pages, venture capitalist Peter Thiel and his protege succinctly convey Peter Thiel’s worldview. The books’ title has become a tech startup cliche shorthand for bringing new innovation to the world. This ranks so highly in my list as I don’t think I’ve read a book with a higher value-per-word ratio than this, so I’d recommend everyone take an evening or two to complete it.

When I recently reviewed another book, I wrote: “My favorite genre is probably “business epics”, a category label I just made up to cover longform biographies done of companies. The historical leaders of this genre (and some of my all-time favorite books) are Barbarians at the Gate, Indecent Exposure, and The Smartest Guys in the Room.”

Indecent Exposure is the oldest of the group and served as an inspiration for many business journalists who followed in McClintick’s footsteps. It’s the “All the President’s Men” of business dramas. It’s not short, but the true absurdity gripped me all the way through this masterpiece on the greed and egos running high-profile industries.

I had already read the classic “Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman” in college. This spiritual sequel is a collection of fewer essays, but contains a couple of much greater emotional and intellectual impact. Specifically, there are two must-read tales: First, Feynman’s reminiscing on the last year of his wife’s life leaves an impression for its emotional honesty. Second, and the largest chunk of the book, is his now-infamous Challenger story, where Feynman uncovers and explains to the government why the space shuttle exploded after launching. These two stories, emotional and intellectual, paint a fuller picture of one of the greatest minds humanity has seen.

Possibly the best book written on the 2008 financial crisis. Keith Gessen, a fantastic writer at n+1 magazine, serves as the everyman while interviewing a friend-of-a-friend who happens to be a professional investor during the Great Recession. Each chapter is a new interview occurring about every three months, spanning a two year period. Over the course of time, The Anonymous Hedge Fund manager educates Gessen (and by proxy, the reader) on the high-level philosophy of financial industry, and the brutality of the day-to-day workings on an industry in disarray. The concept (collecting these interviews over a long period during tumultuous times) is brilliant and the execution is flawless.

“Wind extinguishes a candle and energizes fire.” So begins Taleb’s magnum opus (although he does have a new book coming out in 2018, so he may disagree with that description). Where his prior books highlighted problems, Antifragile moves closer to prescribing, or at least describing, solutions. I prefer not to try and summarize nuanced ideas into a one-liner. This book is for anyone who wishes to be more like fire and less like a candle (or more broadly be able to adapt and thrive in an uncertain world).

As I did in my 2016 review, I’ll just repeat Ben Horowitz’s quote on this book and the amazing man behind it:

Andy himself was a legendary figure. He had grown up Jewish in Hungary during a time when the country was occupied by the Nazis and, later, by the Soviet Communists. Arriving in New York, he spoke no English and had almost no money. He enrolled himself at the City College of New York, overcame his language deficiency, and went on to get a PhD from UC Berkeley. This nonnative English speaker would then write an important textbook on semiconductors in English while working at Fairchild Semiconductor. As a result, he was considered a scientific pioneer even before helping to launch Intel in 1968, building it into the seminal technology company of the era. Later, in 1997, Time magazine would recognize his nearly impossible accomplishments and name him Man of the Year. This is in part what made High Output Management so extraordinary. Andy Grove, who built himself from nothing to run Intel, stopped what he was doing to teach us his magic. And not through some ghostwriter either — Andy wrote this book himself. What an incredible gift.

The best biography I’ve read since college. Much like Dave Chappelle in the early 2000s, Steve Martin stepped down from the standup comedy industry while he was still at the top of the field. But that’s not the noteworthy part. What Steve Martin conveys is the struggle required to reach greatness. The years of performing in front of empty rooms, working odd jobs to make ends meet, and grinding toward an unknown future. It’s told in a compact, straightforward style that is accessible to anyone. If you read it, just maybe it will inspire you to leave all your blood, sweat, and tears on your metaphorical field of dreams.

As the founder of the sensational money management firm Vanguard, Bogle has a unique vantage point on how the financial industry is designed to stealthily steal money from the rest of society. In this concise, consumable manifesto, Bogle lays out important principles for improving our financial industries, corporate America, and our personal lives.

When I previously described Klosterman as a “cultural philosopher”, I meant that not only were the topics about pop culture, but Klosterman writes in a uniquely intelligent way that’s palatable for anyone (the closest comparison to this style I can think of is the scripts from Frasier and The Twilight Zone). The ideas discussed in “But What If We’re Wrong” are simultaneously thought-provoking, relatable, profound, and accessible.

The “Illusion of Safety”, as Schlosser subtitles it, is such a profound point that it can’t be understated. As I alluded to in my review of this book, there is essentially no grander story that can be told than the true story of how humanity could have created its own nuclear apocalypse, and the slim margin of error by which we’ve avoided it thus far

This review is kept short because there aren’t enough bits in our collective computers to capture all the superlatives I’d use to describe it. I rarely find a new book that both breaks into my personal pantheon of favorites and is something that I’d recommend to everyone.

“An entire generation has been raised without experiencing the dread and anxiety of the Cold War, a conflict that lasted almost half a century and threatened to annihilate mankind. This book assumes that most of its readers know little about nuclear weapons, their inner workings, or the strategic thinking that justifies their use. I hope readers who are familiar with these subjects will nevertheless learn a new thing or two here. My own ignorance, I now realize, was profound. No great monument has been built to honor those who served during the Cold War, who risked their lives and sometimes lost them in the name of freedom. It was ordinary men and women, not just diplomats and statesmen, who helped avert a nuclear holocaust. Their courage and their sacrifices should be remembered.”

Overrated

Catching the Wolf of Wall Street – Nowadays I’d give this two stars instead of the three at the time. It’s really only interesting to those who probably saw the “Wolf of Wall Street” movie, and it’s less exciting than the first book.

Underrated

Work Rules: Insights From Inside Google That Will Transform How You Live and Lead – Today I would probably bump this up to four stars, as it’s got great business lessons and Google stories that anyone might find interesting. I probably only gave it three stars in an attempt to not grade too easily. During that set of reviews, I gave only one four star score.

Dead Companies Walking – Received four stars, but in hindsight I think the lessons on evaluating shit businesses and it’s efficient short structure make this worthy of five stars.

Diary of a Very Bad Year – Even for a five star book, this one is exceptionally good. It would’ve been a “Best Book of 6 months” if it wasn’t read around the same time as “Command and Control”.

Lolita – Gave it four stars. The writing style might make it five star-worthy and I only held back due to the subject matter.

The Score Takes Care of Itself – This should’ve been five stars. Walsh’s “standard of performance” concept is a framework I’ve referenced a lot since reading it.

Atlas Shrugged – I gave this a one star rating at the time due to its length. There are enough interesting plot points and enough minimally thought-provoking philosophy to warrant two stars.

The Management Myth – Was a five star but should’ve been even higher. Its philosophical lessons apply beyond the management consulting industry and generally encourage everyone to be more thoughtful individuals.

The Mythical Man Month – Was the lowest rated of the four stars that semi-annual post. I would move that higher now, nearly five-stars, as its an engineering management classic that I have found to be increasingly relevant as my career has continued.

Other Neutral Notes

Chaos Monkeys – Seemed to be the most divisive solely due to the author’s personality (which comes through in the writing style). When I gave this book five stars, I received multiple emails, texts, and Slack messages from friends saying they couldn’t/wouldn’t finish the book as the author’s pomposity overwhelmed any story he was trying to tell. While I can see where this complaint was coming from, I stand by the five star rating because I interpret the author’s stance as being a particular brand of unabashed calling-it-as-he-saw-it, and is still one of the best descriptions of Silicon Valley.

The Alliance by Reid Hoffman – I probably only gave this three stars and not four due to its length, but it contains some very important messages for managers of people.

Slaughterhouse Five – Considering this is one of my favorite works of fiction in the past five years, this deserved a longer review (the one at the time was written in a rush to get the blog post out).

Some Summary Stats:

Average review score makes sense when I reflect upon the two major influencing factors: The sample of books I’ve read (and how that’s selected), and how I grade.

I typically read books that I already know I will like or have come recommended, which will naturally bias the set. The exceptions are the impromptu airport or used bookstore buys, or books that are well-known that I’ll read for the sake of having said I’ve read it (like Atlas Shrugged and Isaac Asimov’s Foundation).

Then, I try to grade using a normal distribution (where a 3/3 is “average but recommendable”) as opposed to the “letter grade” scale (where anything less than 75% is bad).

These two factors show up in the average. I’m naturally inclined to read things I already know I’ll like (which would push the average score up), but then try to consciously grade on a somewhat normal distribution (which would anchor the average around three out of five).

Number of Books Read Over Time:

Length of Books Read Over Time

Following the overall quantity numbers, the next question to come to mind was whether the lengths of the books affected the quantity read in a given time period. Since books vary by length (mostly measured by number of words), it’d really be more precise to track “words read per six months”. But since that’s not really practical, the combination of books by quantity and then estimated length per book are the next closest thing. One could also suspect that, if I were reading at a consistent pace all five years, that periods with low book quantity would be balanced by the fact that the books read were longer/had more words.

I have only categorized books into three sizes (short, medium, and long lengths), and it’s an imprecise categorization, but it does provide some insights.

It’s clearly noticeable that in my first six months in Chicago reading longer books (Atlas Shrugged on the bus trip moving to Chicago) that took up most of that time.

The periods with the highest total quantity read were packed with many shorter books.

Fiction, Biographies, and Other Non-Fiction Split Over Time

Most Read Authors

Below is a list of authors I read at least two books from during this time period:

Michael Lewis – 7

Nassim Taleb – 4

n+1 – 4

Chuck Klosterman – 2

Edge Magazine – 2

David Ogilvy – 2

George Soros – 2

Tyler Cowen – 2

Next is a list of authors I wanted to highlight authors who I read before moving to Chicago who also had books read in these five years.

This past July marked my fifth year in Chicago. It’s an arbitrary milestone, yet feels like a natural reflection point. Upon reflecting, what stands out most to me is the wide variety of great people this city has brought into my life throughout the years.

But this is not a blog about relationships, it’s a blog about books. And many of those people have not followed my reviews all five years, so now is as good a time as any to revisit everything I’ve read since I’ve lived in Chicago.